Eliminate high-quality university programs

Training programs called "high quality" will no longer exist in university admission plans from next year, according to new regulations from the Ministry of Education.

On June 15, the Minister of Education and Training issued a circular abolishing regulations on high-quality university training. This circular takes effect from December 1. Thus, this year is the last year that universities are allowed to enroll students in programs called "high quality".

The Ministry of Education and Training said that this abolition is to implement the revised Law on Higher Education (2018). The Law allows universities to be autonomous and responsible for developing, appraising, and issuing programs. However, the Law and Circular No. 17/2021 regulating training program standards for higher education levels do not include the concept of "high-quality training programs".

Candidates take the 2022 high school graduation exam to get graduation and university admission scores. Photo: Quynh Tran — Candidates take the 2022 high school graduation exam to get graduation and university admission scores. Photo: *Quynh Tran*

Previously, Circular 23 issued in 2014 stipulated that domestic university training programs include two types: mass and high-quality. High-quality programs have conditions to ensure quality and higher output standards than mass programs.

For example, in terms of facilities, high-quality training classes have separate classrooms, equipped with computers connected to the Internet and teaching and learning support devices.

In terms of output, high-quality students are better than the general population in terms of professional competence, application of information technology, leadership, leadership and teamwork skills; and the ability to adapt to the working environment. In terms of foreign languages, high-quality students must achieve at least level 4/6 according to Vietnam's foreign language proficiency framework, while the minimum standard for general population students is level 3/6.

Regarding tuition fees, mass programs must comply with the Government's tuition ceiling regulations (currently about 9.8-14.3 million VND per year). As for high-quality programs, schools can decide their own tuition fees.

In fact, according to Circular 23, a series of universities have opened high-quality training programs. These programs often charge tuition fees 2-3 times higher than the mass system, with some schools charging up to 100 million VND per year. The number of students per class is about 30, compared to 50-100 in the regular system. However, paradoxically, high-quality programs often have lower entrance scores than the mass system.

Although the abolition of the high-quality program will not take effect until December, many schools this year have proactively removed the high-quality program from their enrollment plans or replaced it with a different name. For example, the University of Medicine and Pharmacy, Hanoi National University, no longer enrolls students in the high-quality Dentistry program. The University of Economics and Law, Ho Chi Minh City National University, has removed the name of the high-quality program in its majors and converted it to English-language training programs.

Duong Tam

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